Scientists believe there could be a planet capable of supporting life in the vicinity of a dying sun. If confirmed, this would be the first time a potentially habitable planet circling a “white dwarf” star has been identified.

The planet was determined in the star’s “habitable zone,” a region where life can flourish without being too cold or too hot. The findings were published in the monthly notifications of the Royal Astronomical Society. According to the study’s leader, Prof. Jay Farihi of University College London, the sighting was completely unique to astronomers. When massive stars die, they become black holes, whereas smaller stars, like our Sun, become white dwarfs, or stars that have burned through all of their nuclear material and lost their outer layers. They are the size of a planet when they initially form and emit a bluish-white light. The hypothetical planet is 117 light-years away from Earth and is 60 times closer to the star than our planet is to the Sun.

The existence of the planet is not proven, but the movement of 65 Moon-sized objects about the white dwarf’s habitable zone suggests it does. The distance between the structures does not change, indicating that they are influenced by a nearby planet’s gravity.